Fighting rages in Gaza’s Rafah; tensions with Lebanon soar
GAZA STRIP: Israeli air strikes and clashes between troops and Palestinian militants rocked Gaza on Wednesday, after Israel’s army warned it had readied an offensive against Lebanon’s Hezbollah movement on the country’s northern front. Witnesses and the civil defence agency in the Hamas-run Gaza Strip reported Israeli bombardment in western Rafah, where medics said drone […]
Russian nuclear submarine, frigate arrive in Cuba
HAVANA: A Russian navy frigate and a nuclear-powered submarine churned into Havana harbour on Wednesday, a stopover the US and Cuba said posed no threat, but which was widely seen as a Russian show of force as tensions rise over the Ukraine war. Curious onlookers, fishermen and police lined the Malecon seafront boulevard under grey […]
Experts blame air pollution for 135m premature deaths
SINGAPORE: Pollution from man-made emissions and other sources like wildfires have been linked to around 135 million premature deaths worldwide between 1980 and 2020, a Singapore university said on Monday. Weather phenomena like El Nino and the Indian Ocean Dipole worsened the effects of these pollutants by intensifying their concentration in the air, Singapore’s Nanyang […]
Israeli strike on UN school in Gaza leaves 40 dead
• UN says attacking, targeting its buildings against international law • US, other states call on Tel Aviv, Hamas to swiftly finalise truce deal • Ceasefire talks in Doha show no sign of breakthrough CAIRO: Israel hit a Gaza school on Thursday with what it described as a targeted airstrike on up to 30 Hamas […]
US presses for probe, says ground operation in Rafah not warranted
WASHINGTON: Urging Israel to conduct a thorough investigation into a tent city bombing and uphold its obligations under international humanitarian law, the US on Tuesday said it didn’t believe a major ground operation in Rafah was warranted. White House spokesperson John Kirby maintained that the Israeli strike that killed dozens of Palestinians in Rafah did […]
Helicopter carrying Iran’s president suffers a ‘hard landing,’ state TV says without further details
DUBAI: A helicopter carrying Iranian President Ebrahim Raisi suffered a “hard landing” on Sunday, Iranian state media reported, without immediately elaborating. Raisi was travelling in Iran’s East Azerbaijan province. State TV said the incident happened near Jolfa, a city on the border with with the nation of Azerbaijan, some 600 kilometres (375 miles) northwest of […]
NDA’s show of strength in Varanasi after PM Modi files nomination papers
NEW DELHI: In a show strength, top leaders of BJP-led NDA, including Maharashtra Chief Minister Eknath Shinde, former Andhra Pradesh CM Chandrababu Naidu and LJP’s Chirag Paswan among others gathered outside the Varanasi collectorate as Prime Minister Narendra Modi filed his nomination papers for the Lok Sabha elections 2024. After filing the nomination, Prime Minister […]
SC gives Arvind Kejriwal interim bail till June 1
NEW DELHI: The Supreme Court on Friday gave Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal interim bail till June 1 for campaigning in the ongoing Lok Sabha elections. A bench of Justices Sanjiv Khanna and Dipankar Datta said Kejriwal, arrested in a money laundering case linked to the alleged excise policy scam, will have to surrender and […]
Vote to save Constitution, protect democracy: Kharge
NEW DELHI: Congress president Mallikarjun Kharge on Tuesday urged the people to exercise their franchise to “save the Constitution and protect democracy”, as the voting for the third phase of Lok Sabha elections gets underway. In a post on X, the Congress chief wrote, “Vote to save Constitution, vote to protect democracy. 11 Crore people […]
Russian rockets kill three, as rivals mark Orthodox Easter
KYIV: Russian strikes on the eastern Ukrainian regions of Donetsk and Kharkiv killed three people and wounded at least a dozen more, officials said on Sunday. These latest attacks came as Orthodox Christians in Ukraine and Russia celebrated Easter, and as Moscow said its forces had captured another village on the battlefield. “In Pokrovsk, rocket […]